Tamil Nadu Startup Partners With Forest Department to Transform Plastic Waste Into Furniture for Forest Offices

At dawn, the steps leading up the sacred Vellingiri Hills in Tamil Nadu fill with pilgrims. Known as the ‘Kailash of the South’, the hills draw thousands who undertake the steep climb as an act of faith, carrying offerings, food packets and bottles of water.

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By evening, as pilgrims return, forest staff and volunteers begin another ritual of their own: clearing the plastic left behind on the forest trail.

This year, that waste returns to the sacred hills in an unexpected form.

Furniture installed at the Forest Range Office in Booluvampatti near the Vellingiri Hills is made from plastic collected along the trekking route. The pieces include an almirah, a table and a three-seater sofa.

The initiative is the result of a collaboration between the Tamil Nadu Forest Department and Coimbatore-based Recompose Recycling Private Limited, a clean-tech start-up specialising in recycling multi-layer plastics (MLP).

Closing the loop on pilgrimage waste

Multi-layered plastic, commonly found in snack wrappers and sachets carried by devotees, is notoriously difficult to recycle. Instead of sending this material to landfill, forest officials partner with Recompose Recycling to process and convert it into usable products.

Plastic waste collected from the hills is cleaned, processed and transformed into roofing sheets, covering sheets, paver blocks and other materials.

This recycled material is then fabricated into furniture, now used by the forest department. By installing the finished pieces within the forest office itself, the initiative creates a visible link between waste generation and responsible reuse.

For a pilgrimage site that experiences a seasonal surge in visitors, the model provides a structured approach to managing plastic waste without shifting the burden downstream.

From wrappers to a bus shelter

The company’s work extends beyond the Vellingiri Hills. In Kittampalayam village panchayat in Coimbatore district, multi-layered plastic waste is used to construct a bus shelter, replacing a damaged structure.

“Over nine months, we gather 1,908 kg of MLP for this project,” says C Prashanth of Recompose Recycling Private Limited after the project concluded in November 2024.

The effort is rooted in local participation. Village Panchayat President V M C Chandrasekar says residents are educated on source segregation and repurposing organic waste as compost for farms.

Of the 800 kg of waste generated in the village, the panchayat uses the MLP portion to replace the damaged shelter with one made of recycled plastic.

The structure now stands as everyday proof that low-value, hard-to-repurpose plastic can be redirected into durable public infrastructure when segregation and processing systems are in place.

Beyond Vellingiri: Recycling models reshaping India’s plastic waste

Several Indian enterprises experiment with construction materials and products made from plastic waste.

Banyan Nation builds a formal supply chain that converts discarded plastic into high-quality recycled granules for manufacturing.

Bengaluru-based social enterprise PotHoleRaja uses plastic waste to repair potholes and build durable, water-resistant roads.

These efforts indicate that the technology and expertise to convert plastic into long-lasting products already exist.

What the Vellingiri initiative demonstrates is how such solutions can be integrated directly at sites of faith, in collaboration with local governments and other stakeholders.

Each year, thousands undertake the trek up the Vellingiri Hills in an act of faith. Today, through organised collection and recycling, the plastic left along the trail is converted into functional assets — supporting the same forest landscape that pilgrims come to revere.

Sources

‘Waste collected from Vellingiri Hills turned into furniture at forest office’: by The Hindu, Published on 16 February 2026.

‘Multi-layered plastic collected from Vellingiri Hills to turn value-added products’: by Wilson Thomas for The Hindu, Published on 5 March 2025.

‘Village panchayat in Coimbatore builds bus shelter from 1908 kg of processed plastic waste’: by The Hindu, Published on 9 November 2024.